Last night my son h.i.t me and I didn’t cry. This morning I got out the nice tablecloth, served breakfast like on special occasions, and when he came downstairs smiling he said, “So you finally learned your lesson”… until he saw who was waiting for him at my table.

“Sit down, Wyatt,” I told him, and he noticed that my voice was no longer filled with the pleading fear he was used to.

He roughly dragged a chair out and slumped into it while Harrison slid the brown folder into the center of the table.

“It is ridiculous that you think you can hit your mother and then just walk down to breakfast as if nothing happened,” Harrison said.

“I didn’t hit her, it was just an argument that got a little loud,” Wyatt spat back.

“I saw the mark on her face, Wyatt,” Harrison countered.

“It was just a push,” Wyatt lied, turning to me with a bitter look.

“So now you are going to hide behind my dad? How brave of you, Mom,” he sneered.

“I called him because last night I realized that I cannot handle your violence alone anymore,” I replied.

Harrison opened the folder and took out the first sheet of paper, which was a request for a temporary protection order.

“This depends entirely on what you do today, but here is the cancellation of your access to your mother’s bank accounts and her truck,” Harrison explained.